Key takeaways
- Understand is NeuroCheck Pro's paid self-guided tier at £29.99, designed for adults or parents who have a positive Explore result and want a thorough evidence base before talking to a clinician.
- It uses the same instruments researchers and clinicians rely on, including BAARS-IV, RAADS-R, SRS-2, BRIEF-A/BRIEF-2, WFIRS-S, TAS-20, MAIA-2, PHQ-9, GAD-7, OCI-R, Vineland-3, Conners 3 and the Glasgow Sensory Questionnaire.
- Where the pathway involves ADHD, Understand adds a five-task cognitive performance battery measuring sustained attention, response inhibition, cognitive control, working memory and spatial attention. Results are presented as plain performance evidence, never a clinical verdict.
- Understand is still screening, not diagnosis. The diagnosis happens in Confirm, with a qualified clinician.
NeuroCheck Pro is built around three tiers: Explore, our free screen; Understand, described here; and Confirm, our clinician-led diagnostic tier. Each one builds on the last, and nothing you complete is ever repeated, so the further you go, the more ground you cover without starting again.
If Explore gave you a result worth acting on, Understand is the natural next step. It is NeuroCheck Pro's paid, self-directed tier, and it is the point where a quick screen turns into a genuinely thorough one. Where Explore gives you a quick read across a handful of themes, Understand gives you the full picture: every validated instrument relevant to your result, a set of short cognitive tasks, and a detailed personal report you can bring to a clinical conversation. It is still something you complete yourself, in your own time, with no clinician involved yet, but by the end you will have the same depth of evidence a specialist assessment would gather.
Understand screens for both ADHD and autism, and it is built to handle them together, not just side by side. You can go through the battery for ADHD alone, autism alone, or both together if that reflects your situation; this last option matters because the two conditions overlap often enough that looking at only one can miss real signal in the other.
What Understand actually does
Understand is still screening, not diagnosis. There is no clinician in this tier and no diagnostic interview; it is you, working through a complete, evidence-based battery at your own pace, on your own device. What you get at the end is a thorough, themed report: the same instruments researchers and clinicians rely on, scored the proper way, and explained in plain language.
Anything you already completed in Explore carries straight through. You are never asked to redo a screen you have paid nothing for and already finished.
How your results are organised
Rather than showing you a list of instrument names, Understand groups everything into nine plain-language themes. Underneath, every instrument is scored exactly the way it was validated to be scored; the themes are just how we present it to you.
- Attention and focus: inattention and sustained attention
- Energy, activity and impulse control: hyperactivity, impulsivity and inhibition
- Thinking and organisation: executive function and working memory
- Social connection and communication: how you connect and communicate with others
- Routines, interests and flexibility: repetitive behaviours and flexibility of thinking
- Sensory experiences: how you process sensory input
- Emotions and body awareness: interoception, alexithymia and emotional regulation
- Mood and wellbeing: depression, anxiety and OCD, with safety checks built in throughout
- Everyday life and independence: functional impact and quality of life
Which themes appear depends on the pathway you are on (ADHD, autism, or both) and your age.
What we screen for: adults (18+)
Adults choose their pathway: ADHD, autism, or both together (AuDHD). Whichever you pick determines which of the themes below apply to you; the ADHD-specific and autism-specific instruments only appear if that pathway is part of your battery.
| Domain | Instrument | What it measures |
|---|---|---|
| Attention, energy, impulse control | BAARS-IV (anchor), WFIRS-S | Adult ADHD traits and impairment |
| Thinking and organisation | BRIEF-A | Adult executive function |
| Social, routines, sensory | RAADS-R, RBQ-2A, SRS-2, Glasgow Sensory Questionnaire | Adult autism battery |
| Emotions and body awareness | TAS-20, MAIA-2 | Alexithymia, interoception |
| Mood and wellbeing | PHQ-9, GAD-7, OCI-R | Depression, anxiety, OCD |
| Everyday life | WFIRS-S, AAQoL-29 | Functional impact, quality of life |
If your pathway involves ADHD, you will also complete a short cognitive performance battery: five brief touch-screen tasks measuring sustained attention, response inhibition, cognitive control, working memory and spatial attention. These tasks have no pass or fail score; they are reported as plain performance evidence alongside your self-report answers, never as a clinical verdict.
What we screen for: children and young people (5 to 17)
The same pathway choice applies: ADHD, autism, or both. The same nine themes cover whichever pathway you and your child are working through, completed by whichever combination of parent, teacher and young person is appropriate for each instrument.
| Domain | Instrument | Rater |
|---|---|---|
| Attention, energy, impulse control | Conners 3 | Parent and teacher |
| Thinking and organisation | BRIEF-2 | Parent and teacher |
| Social, routines, sensory | SRS-2, structured autism parent interview | Parent and teacher |
| Everyday life | Vineland-3 | Parent |
| Mood and wellbeing | PHQ-A, GAD-7 family screens | Young person |
| Emotions and body awareness | Young-person self-report | Young person |
Where a task calls for a cognitive performance element, it uses the same age-appropriate touch-screen tasks as the adult pathway.
What you get at the end
Two things come out of Understand, both from the same set of results: a plain-language personal report, organised by theme, that explains what was measured and what your pattern of results looks like; and a clinician-facing report, the same data presented at instrument level, ready to hand to a professional. Nothing in either report is a diagnosis. Every theme, every safety check, and every result is there to inform a conversation, not to replace one.
The value proposition: what Understand gets you closer to
Understand exists for one reason: to make the conversation with a clinician as productive as possible. Instead of walking in with a vague sense that something might be going on, you walk in with a full, validated evidence base, organised and ready to discuss.
This is not a diagnosis, and we say so throughout the journey. A diagnosis is a clinical judgement, made by a qualified professional who can weigh your history, your results and a structured interview together; that is what happens in Confirm, our clinician-led tier. What Understand gives you is everything a clinician needs to make that judgement well, gathered before you ever have to book an appointment.
If safety comes up anywhere in your answers, in particular around mood and wellbeing, that is flagged and acted on immediately; it never waits for your report to be finished.
Getting started
Understand is a one-off paid tier, completed at your own pace on the NeuroCheck Pro app. Anything from Explore carries forward automatically, and everything you complete in Understand carries forward into Confirm too, so nothing is ever repeated.
Frequently asked questions
What is the NeuroCheck Pro Understand tier?
Understand is NeuroCheck Pro's paid, self-directed screening tier at £29.99. It runs the full validated ADHD and autism battery, including a short cognitive performance battery for ADHD pathways, and produces a personal report plus a clinician-facing report.
What is the difference between Understand and Explore?
Explore is free, takes 10 to 15 minutes, and uses short screeners to give a quick read across eleven themes. Understand is paid, takes longer, and uses the full validated instrument set a specialist assessment would draw from. Both are screening, neither is diagnostic.
What instruments are used in the adult Understand battery?
Adults on the ADHD pathway complete the BAARS-IV (anchor), WFIRS-S, BRIEF-A, PHQ-9, GAD-7, OCI-R, and a five-task cognitive performance battery. Adults on the autism pathway complete RAADS-R, RBQ-2A, SRS-2, the Glasgow Sensory Questionnaire, TAS-20, MAIA-2, AAQoL-29 and WFIRS-S. The AuDHD pathway combines both.
Does Understand produce a diagnosis?
No. Understand is a thorough screening tier, not a diagnostic assessment. A formal diagnosis requires a clinician-administered structured interview, which is the Confirm tier. Understand's value is in producing a complete, validated evidence base to bring to that conversation.
Can my child's teacher complete part of Understand?
Yes. For children aged 5 to 17, the battery is split across parent, teacher and the young person as appropriate for each instrument. The Conners 3 and BRIEF-2, for example, have separate parent and teacher forms, and the Vineland-3 is completed by the parent.
Sources and references
- Barkley RA. Attention-Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder: A Handbook for Diagnosis and Treatment. Guilford Press.
- DuPaul GJ, et al. Conners 3rd Edition.
- Gioia GA, et al. BRIEF-A / BRIEF-2.
- Conners CK, et al. Adult ADHD Self-Report Scale (BAARS-IV).
- Wija M, et al. Weiss Functional Impairment Rating Scale (WFIRS-S).
- Ritvo RA, et al. RAADS-R.
- Constantino JN, Gruber CP. Social Responsiveness Scale (SRS-2).
- Robertson AE, Simmons DR. Glasgow Sensory Questionnaire.
- Bagby RM, et al. Toronto Alexithymia Scale (TAS-20).
- Mehling WE, et al. Multidimensional Assessment of Interoceptive Awareness (MAIA-2).
- Kroenke K, Spitzer RL. PHQ-9; Spitzer RL, et al. GAD-7.
- Foa EB, et al. OCI-R.
- Sparrow SS, et al. Vineland Adaptive Behavior Scales, Third Edition.
- National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE). NG87: Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder.
- American Psychiatric Association. Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition, Text Revision (DSM-5-TR).
Important: Understand is a screening battery, not a diagnostic assessment. It uses validated instruments but does not replace a clinical interview, formulation, or diagnosis by a qualified clinician. If you are in crisis, contact Samaritans on 116 123 (UK and ROI), NHS 111, or your local emergency service.
Important
This article is for information and is not a diagnostic assessment. Recognising signs of autism or ADHD does not constitute a diagnosis. A formal diagnosis requires a qualified clinician, a clinical interview and a review of full history. If you or someone you care for is struggling to cope or in crisis, contact Samaritans on 116 123 (UK and ROI), NHS 111, or your local emergency service.